


Reckless

by ssrhpurgatory



Series: Academic AU [1]
Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Accidental Pregnancy, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, One Night Stand, academic rivalry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-04
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:20:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22119301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ssrhpurgatory/pseuds/ssrhpurgatory
Summary: Dmitri Vologin has spent the past decade fighting a turf war over his area of research with one Dr. Rosemary Epps via letter. Dmitri's sister, Olga, has spent the same amount of time hiding the fact that her beloved mentor, Rosie, is the self-same woman... until she conspires to get Dmitri to the same conference as Rosemary for the first time ever, and it turns out that Rosemary and Dmitri don't hate one another quite as much as they thought they did.AKA chunks of an extremely self-indulgent AU for my nonsense ship.
Relationships: Alexander Hilbert/Original Female Character
Series: Academic AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1592503
Comments: 7
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Started as a pile of [sketch comics.](https://ssrosemaryhilbertpurgatory.tumblr.com/post/186673032612/assorted-sketch-comics-from-the-warring)

_January 1979_

“I have latest edition of _Journal of General Virology_ ,” Olga said, poking her head around the door of Rosemary’s office door.

“Oh?” Rosemary glanced up for a moment, then returned to scanning the latest thesis draft from one of her grad students. He definitely hadn’t taken her recommendations from the last draft he’d handed in, the latest in a series of examples of him not quite respecting her subject knowledge. She didn’t even know at this point why the man had chosen her as his thesis advisor. “I didn’t realize it was out yet,” she added, distracted by the thesis. “Anything interesting?”

“Well…” Out of the corner of her eye, Rosemary saw Olga eye the cover dubiously.

Rosemary immediately focused all of her attention on the other woman. “Oh, god, what is it this time? Not another paper from Vologin?”

Olga gave her a guilty little grin. “Two.”

“TWO?” Rosemary dove around her desk and snatched the journal out of Olga’s hands, flipping it open and scanning the table of contents. “That RAT BASTARD.”

“At least neither of them overlap with your research this time,” Olga said. “Though… I would not read the footnotes on the second one.”

Rosemary couldn’t resist. She flipped to the second paper and scanned it… and found it there, on the third page of the paper, a specific call-out of her methodology in a past paper she’d had published in the same journal. “I’m going to _kill_ that man if I ever meet him in person,” she growled, throwing the journal down on her desk.

“And everyone knows it, which is why the two of you have never been invited to the same conferences,” Olga said mildly. “But you know, you might actually like the man if you met him.”

“Look, Olga, I know he must be a relative of yours somewhere down the line, but that man is a no-good self-important rat bastard.”

Olga simply smiled. “I will be home late tonight. Try not to suffer a fit of apoplexy over the man, Rosie.”

“I make no such promises!” Rosemary yelled after Olga, then sighed and flopped back into her office chair. Olga was probably right; Rosemary most likely _would_ like the man if she met him. After having a good shout at him for a good half-hour, of course. But he was a brilliant scientist, and deep down, as much as she liked to complain about him, she respected his work.

She just wished his tone wasn’t so damn smug, especially in the reams of angry letters that always flew back and forth between the two of them whenever one or the other of them published something new. In an ideal world, they would be collaborators; in reality, Dmitri Vologin’s papers always left Rosemary fuming about one thing or another, and it seemed her work had the same effect on him.

Speaking of which... she definitely owed him a letter for that footnote.

An angry one.

_June 1979_

“You sure you won’t extend your contract another year?” Rosemary asked Olga, holding the other woman’s hands in her own as she bid her farewell in the airport.

Olga gave Rosemary a smile and leaned in to hug her. “I would love to, you know I would. But I worry about what Dima has gotten up to in my absence, you know, and it would be cruel to leave him alone with my cats for any longer. And…” she pulled back and looked directly at Rosemary, her expression a little sad. “I wanted to think there was some future here, but there isn’t, is there?”

Rosemary gaped for a moment and worked her jaw, trying to find words. Finally, she sighed. “I was willing to try, if you wanted to stay.”

Olga leaned forward again to kiss Rosemary on the forehead. “It is not your fault. The strongest relationship you have is with your work, not with other people. But I need someone who will love me just as much as the viruses and microbes in her lab, da?”

“I do care about you, Olga,” Rosemary said, but even to her own ears her voice sounded flat and unconvincing.

“I know you do. But I think, if you do find someone you wish to spend the rest of your life with, you will need to do a whole lot more than simply care for them.” Olga said. “And they will have to do a whole lot more than care for you,” she added, raising her eyebrows in amusement. “It will take a good deal of passion to drag you away from your lab, Rosie, and as lovely as I find you, I am not passionate about you.”

“No one has that amount of passion,” Rosemary said drily, rolling her eyes.

Olga laughed. “You might find yourself surprised by that some day, Rosie.” She glanced down to the boarding gate. “It looks as if boarding has started. I will call you when I get back to brother’s apartment.”

“Safe travels.”

“Thank you.”

Dmitri hugged his older sister close. “It is good to see you again, Olyusha.”

“It will be good to have someone else around to take care of the cats, you mean,” Olga said with a smile, reaching up to ruffle his hair. “When did you last get haircut?”

“Long hair is in style,” Dmitri said stiffly.

“Not that long.” Olga grabbed her suitcase and made her way towards the door, and Dmitri hastened after her. “So, how have your classes been this semester?”

“Good. I have had good students. One or two might even have learned something. I know you said your fall classes were abysmal, but I could not get sense of this spring.”

“Very good. I co-taught a seminar with Dr. Epps,” Olga said, grinning at her brother.

Dmitri felt his mood immediately turn sour. “Oh, _her._ ”

“Dmitri, she is at top of our field. It was an honor to teach a class with her. She is a good professor, you know. All of her students love her.”

“She is far too casual with her language. Of course her students love her,” grumbled Dmitri.

“You are just annoyed that your own papers are not so compulsively readable as hers are,” Olga said, a hint of suppressed laughter in her voice. “And I think you would like her, if you met her.”

“I would rather die.”

“You know, that’s what she says about you too.”

“What, that she would rather die than meet me?”

“No, that she intends to kill you if she ever meets you,” Olga said, giving in to her laughter.

They paused by Olga’s car, which Dmitri had been borrowing during her year in America, and he unlocked the doors. “Well, she is welcome to try. It would certainly prevent me from the misery I would no doubt experience in her presence.”

Olga was laughing almost too hard to breathe, a condition which persisted a few minutes into the drive back to the apartment that the two of them would be sharing once again now that Olga was back in the country. Dmitri mentally rolled his eyes and waited for her merriment to wear off, and then asked, “And how is your Rosie?”

Olga went still and silent for a few long minutes.

“Olga?”

“Sorry. It is simply… she is not _my_ Rosie, Dima.”

Dmitri went silent himself, not sure what to say. Over the years, Olga had visited her mentor time and again, and as time had gone on the relationship had drifted from a mentorship into a friendship, and from a friendship into… well, Dmitri was not quite sure what the two women had considered it. This year in America had been a test case—when Olga had mentioned the visit to Rosie, the woman had offered Olga a room in her apartment, and Dmitri knew that Olga had hoped that perhaps the relationship would turn into something more over the course of the year.

Olga cleared her throat, breaking the awkward silence. “It is all for the best. It will be strange for a time, but I think we are more like family than the lovers we were trying to become.”

“I’m sorry,” Dmitri said, stumbling over the words.

Olga reached out and pressed a hand to his shoulder, and Dmitri glanced her way for a moment. She seemed calm. “There is nothing to be sorry about,” she said, with a smile on her face. “I will be heartbroken for a week and then I will move on. And I do not think Rosie will be heartbroken even so long as that.”

Dmitri frowned, but turned his concentration back to the drive back to their apartment. “She ought to be heartbroken, if she has broken your heart,” Dmitri said stubbornly.

Olga let out a light little laugh at that. “My heart is not truly broken, Dima. Just a little bruised. And not even that for long.” And with that, Olga shut her eyes and dozed for the rest of the drive.

_October 1979_

“I am going to conference in America in January.” Olga said. “I would like you to come with me.”

“Which conference?”

“The microbiology conference in San Diego.”

Dmitri made a face. “That Epps woman is guest of honor. I have not been invited.”

“But that does not mean you cannot attend, and you will have to meet her some day, Dmitri. You cannot keep exchanging angry letters with her for rest of life as a way to avoid hashing your differences out in person.”

“Am perfectly happy to try avoiding her for rest of life.”

“Rosie is doing one of her Women in Micro mixers there. I would like you to meet her.”

“I am not so certain I wish to meet your Rosie, either. She did break your heart.”

Olga rolled her eyes. “My heart was never broken over Rosie. And she has been my friend and my mentor for nearly a decade.” Olga paused, suddenly serious. “The two of you are the most important people in my life. I love the both of you dearly, and I want the two of you to love each other as well.”

It was Dmitri’s turn to roll his eyes. “I will meet her. I make no promises to love her.”

“Fine, then, I want you to at least try to like her.”

Dmitri sighed. “I will try.”

_January 1980_

“Are you sure I should be here?” Dmitri asked. “Is _women_ in microbiology mixer. I could wait outside for you to bring Rosie to me.”

“Rosie does not ever leave mixer until end, and we arrived too late to introduce you to her before it started. She will not mind having you in here, though. I told her I was bringing you to meet her.” Olga stood on her tiptoes and glanced around the room. “Now, to see if I can spot—ah! There she is! Rosie, over here!” Olga called out and beckoned to someone who was hidden by the crowd of women in the mixer from Dmitri’s point of view.

There was a swirl of movement in the crowd, and a short, fat black woman burst through, immediately sweeping Olga into a hug. Dmitri’s first impression of the woman was of a brief glimpse of a shining smile, of carefully sculpted hair, of a tweed suit jacket and wool trousers, both in shades of teal.

“Oh, you look marvelous!” the woman exclaimed as she pulled back from Olga’s hug. “How are you?” As she pulled back, something about her face started niggling at the back of Dmitri’s brain, a strange familiarity. Perhaps he had seen her photo attached to a journal article, or was it that he had encountered her at a conference? But no, Olga had said that he had never met the woman, but how could that be true unless she was...

“Fantastic,” Olga said, grinning down at the woman. “And guess who I have brought to meet you?” As Olga answered the woman, the sense of familiarity increased, and a horrifying thought entered Dmitri’s mind.

The woman turned to look at Dmitri, a bright, shining smile on her face that stopped his breath in his chest. “This is horrible little brother Dima, yes?” She looked him over, and then a sudden frown crossed her face. “Oh, no. It’s _you._ ”

Dmitri frowned back. “Dr. Epps, I presume.”

“Vrach Vologin,” Dr. Epps answered in an icy tone. “So good to finally meet you. You know, I have a bone or two to pick with you about your last paper in the _Journal of General Virology._ ”

“Oh, you have bone to pick with me?” Dmitri bristled, folding his arms across his chest protectively as Dr. Epps pointed at his face as if lecturing him directly. “You undermined seven months of work with your last paper! Seven months!”

“Well, how was I to know you were working on the viral progression of that particular strain of bird flu? It’s not as if you put out a bulletin saying ‘Keep out, this is the property of Dmitri Vologin!’”

“Because I was afraid of this exact thing happening! You always undercut my work!”

“I always undercut _your_ work?”

Olga watched with a grin as her brother and the woman who had been one of her best friends for years shouted at one another, each of them completely ignoring personal space as they argued. It was not a promising beginning, but it had been coming for nearly a decade, and it was about time they got it out of their systems.

A vague acquaintance of Olga’s edged up to her side. “Wow. That does not look like it’s going well.”

Olga couldn’t help but give her companion an excited grin. “I have been planning this disaster for years, Aditi. YEARS.”

Aditi’s eyebrows shot up her face in surprise. “Well then. In that case…” She offered the plate full of hors d’oeuvres that she had carried over with her to Olga. “Nibblies?”

“Oooh, thank you.” Olga selected a miniature quiche and nibbled it carefully, holding her free hand underneath to catch crumbs. “Oh, this is good.”

“The selection’s really nice this year. Rosie found an excellent caterer.”

“Mmm.” Olga eyed the plate, and Aditi laughed and handed the entire thing over. “Oh, thank you. Our connecting flight was delayed, and there was no dinner service.”

“So you’re both running on packets of peanuts and fizzy water? No wonder your brother’s so cranky.”

“Yes, well, Rosie brings out the worst in him,” Olga said around a mouthful of eclair. “The best, too, though I do not think he has realized that yet.”

Both women tilted their heads to the side and watched Rosie and Dmitri arguing. The argument had only increased in heat since it had begun; there were wild gesticulations and off-the-cuff insults flying.

“How long do you think it will be before one of them attempts to murder the other?” Aditi snagged one of the tiny quiches off the plate.

Olga let out a snort of laughter and took the last tiny quiche for herself. “Murder is not on the table, no matter how much the two of them may claim they dislike each other. In fact, twenty dollars says one of them kisses the other in the next fifteen minutes.”

Aditi blinked and shot Olga a confused look. “Rosemary really isn’t the sort to go around kissing people she just met in the middle of the micro mixer. I’m a bit surprised she hasn’t turfed your brother out by now, to be honest.” She paused, and took a thoughtful bite out of the quiche she had snagged. “And I thought your brother was gay.”

“Mm.” Olga hurriedly swallowed her mouthful of quiche. “No, he is attracted to people who challenge him intellectually. And so is Rosie. But Dmitri’s thesis advisor was a bit of a misogynist and some of that rubbed off on him, so he has not admitted for years that a woman is capable of providing him with that sort of challenge.”

Aditi gave Olga a peculiar look. “So, what, you dragged him here to get Rosemary to take him down a peg?”

Olga shrugged. “That, and I wanted to see what would happen. They have been fighting a turf war over the same areas of our field for nearly ten years, which if I am right about both of their characters…” She trailed off and raised a suggestive eyebrow at Aditi.

“Oh dear,” Aditi said, the same idea that had first entered Olga’s mind a year ago obviously crossing hers as well.

“Like a decade of angry, angry foreplay,” Olga said with satisfaction in her voice. “And both of them have been single for far too long. Getting laid will do them good.”

“If you say so,” Aditi said dubiously. “My bet’s still on physical violence.”

As Aditi said this, Rosemary grabbed Dmitri by the lapel, obviously planning to pull him closer to yell directly in his face.

And then, one of Dmitri’s hands cupped her cheek and the second came down on her shoulder, and he leaned down and planted a kiss on her open mouth.

“You are so much more infuriating in person!” Dr. Vologin yelled, his hands gesticulating wildly to either side of her.

Rosemary wasn’t entirely certain how she’d gotten so close to him, but it only seemed appropriate to grab him by the lapel and haul him down to her level. Dr Vologin put a steadying hand on her shoulder as she did. “Yeah, well so are y-” she started to say, but she was cut off as his other hand cupped her cheek almost tenderly, as his mouth came down on her own, startling her breath out of her. And then she was clinging to the lapel of his jacket, hard, and kissing him back.

Dr. Vologin—no, after a kiss like that, he was definitely Dmitri— pulled away from the kiss first, seeming a little startled by his own actions, but unwilling, or perhaps unable to let go of her. He rubbed a thumb across her cheekbone, staring at her in wonder. “Please tell me you are single. And interested,” he said in a small, desperate voice.

“Yes to both,” Rosemary responded, her own voice breathy and desperate as well.

“Oh, goo-”

Rosemary couldn’t wait another second. She threw her arms around his neck and pulled his mouth back to hers, cutting him off as effectively as he’d cut her off earlier, perhaps a little more violently than necessary. One of her teeth cut her inner lip, but she paid the small stab of pain no mind because her entire being was focused on the place where Dmitri’s mouth was meeting hers, on the length of his body pressed up against her.

Olga had been right, Rosemary found herself thinking. She did like Dmitri Vologin, very much.

“Go get a room, you two!” Olga’s voice broke through the haze that Rosemary had fallen into, and she pulled back from Dmitri, panting hard.

“My room?” Rosemary asked, her voice still barely there.

Dmitri nodded, and together they dashed towards the entrance to the event room and the elevators just beyond.


	2. Chapter 2

Dmitri shared an apartment with his sister in Saint Petersburg, so it had only been natural to choose to be roommates for the length of the conference. They had booked a double room together and Dmitri had been more than content with the arrangement.

But now, Dmitri was suddenly realizing how much of a damper his sister’s presence in his room would have put on the sort of activities he hoped to engage in shortly. With Rosemary Epps, of all people. Fortunately, Rosemary had a room of her own… and, as she was guest of honor, no roommate to go with it.

Rosemary couldn’t seem to stop fiddling with the top button of her jacket during the interminable elevator ride. Dmitri wanted to seize her hand to make her stop, but given how fully they’d both thrown themselves into kissing one another… no. It would be better to wait until they were in her hotel room before he touched her again.

The elevator dinged, and Rosemary made a guttural, frustrated noise as the door edged slowly open. She dove through as soon as it was open far enough, and Dmitri followed her swiftly down the hallway, to where she was trying to unlock her door with a shaking hand. He almost reached out to help, but withdrew, still not daring to touch her. After a moment the door swung open and Rosemary grabbed his hand, pulling him through after her.

Dmitri slammed the door behind him and and swung her around against the wall, pressing into her, his mouth already on hers. She matched him kiss for kiss as they started pulling buttons loose from moorings, each of them tossing garments aside and not particularly caring where they landed. He pulled back a bit to look down at Rosemary and let out a soft groan. She was staring up at him with dark, heavy-lidded eyes, lips swollen with kisses, her bra pushing her breasts up as if presenting them for his perusal.

But he had to be sure. “Are you certain?”

Rosemary bit her lower lip and smiled. And then she pulled him down into another kiss. “Yes,” she murmured, her lips still brushing his. “Now shut up and get ready to fuck me senseless.”

She could not have made herself any more clear.

Dmitri was more than happy to comply.

Dmitri was almost too sore to move when he woke up the next morning. No wonder; he did not think he had ever been so… so active in a single night before.

Rosemary was cuddled up against his side, her face tucked against his shoulder and slack with sleep, and he found himself studying her carefully in the dim morning light. Her lashes were soft against her cheeks, her lips slightly parted, the wrinkles that creased her face when it was in motion barely visible now that she was at rest.

He thought he might give a great deal to wake up like this every morning.

Ah, no, where had that thought come from? He barely knew the woman.

Though that was not entirely true either. He knew her very well indeed, in some ways. Knew her as a scientist, knew her as a colleague, and now… He reached over and cupped her shoulder, rubbing his thumb across the smooth skin of it, interrupted here and there by the pale tracery of stretch marks. Rosemary stretched and shifted beneath his touch, her body moving against his, and rousing those very base instincts that had kept them up most of the night before.

“What time is it?” she murmured, pressing a kiss to his shoulder.

Dmitri squinted over her shoulder at the hotel’s digital clock. “Close to eight.”

He felt Rosemary’s lips curve into a smile against his skin. “Time for one more round, then, if you’re up for it.”

Dmitri snorted. “How can you move?”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to do much more than waddle like a penguin all day, but it was probably worth it,” she said, lifting her head to press a kiss to his neck.

“Truly insatiable.”

“Have been since I turned 40, darling. Nothing new there.”

And she was taking him with her. Still… “Are you not giving a keynote speech at nine?”

“Fuck. Yes. You’re right. Probably not enough time.” She pulled back with a sigh. “Well, there’s always tonight?” She asked the question with more than a little anxiety in her voice, and Dmitri rushed to reassure her.

“I could move my clothing in here, if you are willing to let me stay.”

Her eyes fell shut and she bit her lower lip, so hard he worried she was about to draw blood. And then she released it on a sigh. “I shouldn’t say yes, but…”

“If it would make you feel uncomfortable—“

Rosemary shut him up with her fingers, pressed lightly to his lips. “It doesn’t. That’s what’s bothering me.”

Dmitri laughed. “You too?”

“God.” She let out a snort of laughter of her own. “Your sister kept telling me I’d like you.”

Dmitri froze. His sister. “Ah. I… ah.”

Rosemary let out a sigh of breath. “Yeah. Okay. Might as well address the elephant in the room. Yes, I did have an intimate relationship with your sister. One that didn’t go anywhere, but…”

A fact he hadn’t needed to have confirmed to know that it had happened, the way Olga spoke about Rosemary. “I knew.”

“And it bothers you.”

Less than it should. “Yes.”

“So if that means this needs to stop right now, let me know.”

“ _No._ ” The word rushed out before he could think it through. But no, Dmitri could not bear the thought of spending the rest of this conference separated from this woman, even if it was just a heated fling that would burn itself out over the course of the weekend. Even if she had a history with his sister.

“All right.” She brushed a kiss to his cheek before pushing herself upright, wincing a bit as she did, obviously as sore as he was. “I’m going to go get ready for the day, but I’ll leave you my keycard so you can get back in once you’ve gathered your things.”

“Very good.” Dmitri watched as she slid out of bed, as she gathered her things out of her suitcase, as she left him her key card on the bedside table and went towards the bathroom. It was only once she was out of sight that he could bring himself to start moving, slow, careful stretches that still pushed his strained muscles to unfamiliar work. He found himself mildly shocked that Rosemary had been able to get up and about as quickly as she had, in comparison.

He shut his eyes and leaned back against the pillow. He would get on with it in a moment.

Just a moment.

Rosemary emerged from the bathroom to find Dmitri asleep again and snoring, the same raspy noise that had lulled her off to sleep the night before after round number four. Poor fellow. He obviously wasn’t used to that sort of thing.

Granted, neither was she. The shower had done wonders, but she had only been able to spend so long in there before needing to peel her shower cap off and make the best of her hair. She had forgotten to wrap it the night before and now she was paying for it; even with it flat-ironed into submission it still had a mind of its own, especially if she didn’t maintain it.

She reached out and gently shook Dmitri’s shoulder. His eyes fluttered open and he frowned up at her, squinting near-sightedly. “Wha?”

“You dozed off again, darling.”

“Ah.” He stretched and winced. “Apologies.”

“Let’s get you upright and into a shower, all right? You can figure out clothing later.”

He took her offered hand and let her pull him upright. And then he glanced over his shoulder at her clock with a frown. “You should go. Get yourself some breakfast before your talk.”

“Are you sure?”

Dmitri nodded. “Take your keycard. We will arrange things later?” He turned back towards her with a wide-eyed anxious look on his face.

Rosemary smiled and cupped his cheek, leaning over to press a kiss to his lips. “Yes. Absolutely.”

“Good. Now go!” He waved her off, an infectious smile on his face.

“I’m going!” She scooped her keycard up off her bedside table. “See you after the keynote.”

“I would not miss it.”

“Well, good.”

“Go!”

Rosemary laughed and left her room.

Olga found Rosemary within a minute of her entering the hotel’s breakfast room, appearing at her side with a bright smile on her face as Rosemary was pouring herself a cup of coffee. “Congratulations!”

Rosemary raised an eyebrow. “For…?”

Olga smirked. “For being the first person to complete the Vologin twins set.”

Rosemary glared at her friend. Of course Olga would rub it in. “Yes, thanks so much for reminding me first thing in the morning why me hooking up with your brother is _super awkward_.”

Olga only laughed. “Speaking of my brother, where _is_ Dmitri?”

“Oh. Uh. He’s still in bed.”

This startled another laugh out of Olga. “But it is almost 9 a.m.! Rosie, did you _break_ my brother?”

Rosemary rolled her eyes. “Nothing of the sort.”

“I am just saying, if you broke him, you have to keep him.”

“Olga, I am _not_ taking your useless brother off your hands.” Rosemary considered the hot breakfast bar and decided with a sigh of regret that she would not have time to sit down for breakfast. Well, a muffin would do just as well.

“He’s not entirely useless. He can cook!”

That got Rosemary’s attention. She was a terrible cook herself. “Really?”

Olga only beamed at her in response.

“No!”

“Just consider it. He would make a very good house husband.”

Rosemary snorted and selected a blueberry muffin. “Olga, I do _not_ need you to give me a sales pitch for your brother!”

“And I would be a terrible house husband,” came a murmur in Dmitri’s low voice, followed by his hand snaking over her shoulder to select a muffin of his own off the rack of baked goods. His hair was damp and he was wearing yesterday's rumpled clothing, and he looked...

Rosemary blushed. Well, better to not spend too much time thinking about how he looked. And hopefully he wouldn’t have heard too much of their conversation, but it was still embarrassing that he had overheard as much as he had. “I’m going to go review my notes for the keynote. You two pester each other for a while, all right?”

Olga turned on Dmitri once Rosemary was gone. “Well?”

“Olga, please.”

“I knew you would like her.”

Dmitri sighed. “Yes. I like her. Are you happy?”

“Ecstatic. When is the wedding?”

“ _Olga._ ”

“All right, then when is your first co-authored paper coming out?”

He glared at his sister. “Why are you so intent on this, anyway? Should you not be angry?”

“That my brother and my best friend are no longer fighting?” Olga’s eyes were wide and innocent.

“That I… that we…” He could not even bring himself to say the words.

“I told you months ago, Dmitri,” Olga said, suddenly serious. “She and I were never going to work as more than friends. And the two of you have been fighting for so long. I was getting sick of it.”

Dmitri could not find a response to that.

“Shall we go to the keynote?” Olga asked brightly.

“Let me just get coffee…”

“Hurry up!”


	3. Chapter 3

_February 1980_

The end of the conference had come all too quickly for Dmitri. He and Rosemary had promised to write one another—after all, it was not as if they did not exchange plenty of correspondance as a matter of course, though in the past most of it had been the academic equivalent of cursing at one another from a distance—and they had, but he found himself missing her physical presence far more than he expected to.

But he definitely had not been _moping_ , as much as his sister was currently insisting he had been.

“You have,” Olga said, glaring down at him from over the back of the couch he was sitting on. “And I am sick of it. You have been cranky for weeks.”

Dmitri frowned up at his sister. “I am always cranky. And you are being ridiculous.”

“Am I?” Olga raised her eyebrows and reached past his shoulder to pick up a journal that was on the side table. “So you have not been re-reading Rosemary’s last paper over and over.”

“Of course not,” Dmitri grumbled.

Olga held the journal upright against the couch cushions and then let it fall open on its own. Directly to the first page of Rosemary’s most recent publication. Which he had read a perfectly normal number of times. “Yes, I see,” she said.

“What do you want, Olga?”

“I want my brother to tell me what is wrong.”

Dmitri felt his jaw tense. “It is just…” He looked away, not able to find the right words. Instead he asked the question that was foremost on his mind. “Is it strange that I miss her?”

“Why would it be strange?”

“We only just met! It was a one-night stand!” Not that Dmitri had ever had one of those, but he suspected that one was not supposed to spend the next month moping about it.

Not that he was moping.

When he glanced back in his sister’s direction, Olga’s expression had morphed into one of amused sympathy. “I do not recall you returning to the room after the first night of the conference,” she said, clearly trying to suppress her smile and completely failing.

“Semantics.” Dmitri sighed. “It should not have veen enough to form a… a lasting attachment.”

“Dmitri. How long have you been exchanging angry letters with her for?”

“I…”

“And how long does it take for you to shut up about her after she publishes something new?”

“That is not the same!” he protested. “That is work.”

Olga set her hand on his shoulder. “Dmitri, what is really the matter?”

He could not answer for a moment. How could he say that it bothered him that he envied his sister her friendship with Rosemary? How could he say that he worried that, even now that he and Rosemary were on better terms, she would not want to form such a friendship with him? How could he say that it wasn’t just a friendship he wanted with Rosemary?

“Dmitri?”

He swallowed hard. “What if… what if she does not feel the same way?”

Olga snorted. “Every serious relationship she has had for the past decade has fallen apart because all she would do for the first month after you published something is rant about you to anyone who would listen.”

Dmitri found this unaccountably cheering. “Wait, really?”

“Yes, really.” Olga shoved his shoulder. “It was extremely infuriating to listen to. Believe me.”

“But that does not mean that she… I mean…”

“So call her and find out.”

Could it be that simple? “I do not know her number. And international calls are expensive…”

“So you will pay a larger portion of the phone bill this month. And I have her number. Come, I will dial it for you.”

“Really?”

Olga laughed and straightened up from where she had been leaning on the back of the couch. “Of course I have her number.” She ruffled Dmitri’s hair and then dodged away as he swiped a hand at her irritably. “What would my useless little brother do without me?”

“Would have neater hair,” Dmitri growled, running his fingers through his hair and returning it to its previous pristine state. “And you know I hate it when you call me your little brother.”

“Half an hour makes all the difference in the world, dear youngest sibling.”

Dmitri snorted. “Be serious, Olga. Are you going to give me the number or not?”

She laughed again. “The temptation to keep teasing you is great, but no. I will dial it for you. She should be just waking up now. Come.”

Dmitri stood and followed Olga over to the table where their telephone sat and fidgeted nervously as she dialed and then handed the ringing phone over to Dmitri. “And I think I will take myself out of the apartment for the next hour or so,” she said in a tone of voice that left Dmitri mildly scandalized by the implications.

“We are not going to—“

“Goodbye, Dmitri!” And with a jingle of keys, his sister was gone.

The phone was still ringing. One, two, three, four more times. Dmitri was about to lose his nerve and return the phone to its cradle when there was a click and Rosemary’s voice echoed down the line, sounding sleepy.

“Hello?”

“Rosemary?”

“Dmitri? Is that you?” She still sounded half-asleep, but Dmitri thought that perhaps she was smiling.

“Yes. Did I wake you?”

“No!” There was a pause, and then: “Well, yes, but I was about to wake up anyway.”

“Ah.”

There was an awkward silence, then Rosemary asked “So, decided to move on from angry letters to calling me at home to yell at me about my research?”

“What? No!” Dmitri thought she might be joking, but he was appalled all the same.

“Sorry! Bad attempt at a joke. I’m not…” Rosemary sighed. “This is all… very new for me.”

“…me too,” Dmitri said, wanting desperately to see the expression on her face. There was another awkward silence, and he blurted out “I miss you,” into it.

“…I miss you too.” Rosemary let out a little sad-sounding chuckle. “God, why do I miss you?”

“I… I do not know.”

There was yet another long awkward silence, and Rosemary broke it to add “Listen. Olga was planning to come visit for a few weeks this summer. Once universities are on break. You could… maybe you’d like to come with her?”

Dmitri smiled, and pressed the receiver closer to his ear. “That would be nice,” he murmured.

At the other end of the line, Rosemary’s breathing went suddenly harsh. “Good lord, your voice has a hell of an effect on me,” she murmured back.

“Well,” said Dmitri, pitching his voice lower, imagining her shiver when he did, “I am here to talk about whatever you want me to.”

Rosemary let out a husky laugh. “You’ll make me late for my eight AM class if you do, so I’m afraid I’ll have to turn you down. But if you call back at this same time tomorrow morning…”

“I’ll call you then,” he said, low and urgent.

“Good.” Rosemary sighed. “And now I really do need to hang up and get ready for class.”

Dmitri waited for her to hang up, but they both stayed on the line a few moments more. Finally Rosemary laughed again, a warm, caressing sound that put a smile on Dmitri’s face. “We are ridiculous,” she muttered.

“That is what Olga tells me,” he responded, unable to stop smiling. “I think I do not mind being ridiculous if it is with you.”

“I’m hanging up for real now,” Rosemary responded, her own smile obvious from the sound of her voice. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“Until tomorrow,” Dmitri said, and stood there holding the phone to his ear long after the click that signaled Rosemary hanging up, completely incapable of removing the delighted smile that the sound of Rosemary’s voice had put on his face.

_June 1980_

After two weeks of daily phone calls turned in to two end-of-the-month phone bills laden heavily with expensive international charges, Dmitri and Rosemary quietly switched over to calling once a week. He missed hearing her voice every day, but her letters… Oh, her letters were almost compensation enough for the loss of the phone calls. They were still writing to one another about research, of course, but what had once been brief personal asides inserted into research correspondance had now become long, rambling missives in their own right, from day-to-day anecdotes about things that had happened in her lab to amusing things her students had said in class to stories about her mother, who was apparently trying hard to break every heart in her nursing home.

He tried to write back in kind, but he worried that his responses were stilted and cold compared to hers. But if she found them so, she didn’t complain.

And somehow, one letter and phone call at a time, they had whiled away the four months until summer break began in Russia and he and Olga could take their long-awaited trip to visit Rosemary.

Dmitri was a bundle of nerves from the moment they entered the airport and found himself completely incapable of dozing off for more than a few minutes at a time the entire flight. Olga treated him with a sort of amused tolerance. He suspected it was only her intervention with a well-timed “You will have to excuse my brother, he is seeing his girlfriend for the first time in five months, and he is worried she will no longer like his face,” that got him through customs without a grilling from the suspicious customs officer. Instead, the woman met Olga’s grin with one of her own, and said “Oh, it’s like that, then? Well, good luck to you,” and waved the both of them through.

“She is not my girlfriend,” muttered Dmitri once they were past customs.

“I do not know what she is if she is not your girlfriend,” responded Olga officiously. “Come. Move faster. Your girlfriend is waiting.”

Dmitri sighed and let Olga sweep him along the airport corridors to baggage claim, where Rosemary had said she would meet them. They had claimed their own bags before going through customs, and the thought that he would not even have the delay of waiting for baggage to arrive before Rosemary took them off to her apartment filled him with an elated sort of terror.

Olga paused in the last corridor. Baggage claim was visible through a set of glass doors, but she stopped and took him by the shoulders and made him look her in the eye.

“Dmitri,” she said firmly. “It will be fine. Rosie does not pretend to feel things that she does not feel.”

Dmitri groaned. “That is the problem. We have not discussed… That is, I do not know if she feels the way I…. I mean, I know she likes me, but I…” He broke off. He loved Rosemary. Blyad, he _loved_ Rosemary.

Olga smiled and squeezed his shoulders firmly. “So the two of you will have to have a talk about how to go forward. It is part of being in any relationship.”

Dmitri groaned again and ran his hands through his hair, disheveling it. “Is not too late for me to go back to Russia.”

“Yes, it is,” said Olga, turning him and propelling him towards the doors. He pushed through, and Olga followed, both of them glancing around baggage claim for Rosemary.

“There she is!” yelled Olga. Dmitri turned his head in time to watch his sister run off to one side, her wheeled suitcase rattling along behind her. Olga threw her arms around Rosemary, obscuring her from Dmitri’s view for a moment, then Olga pulled back to look at Rosemary and Dmitri’s breath caught in his throat at the sight of Rosemary’s smiling face over his sister’s shoulder.

Dmitri walked over to join them, pulling his own suitcase along and listening in a bemused fashion as Olga rattled on.

“…and I do like the new hair, Rosie, having it natural suits you. So does this dress. I did not know you owned a dress.” Olga frowned a bit. “Have you gained weight?”

Rosemary laughed, just a little bit guiltily, and Dmitri examined her figure. She had already been fat, but it was true, she did look a bit larger. But only around… around the middle. 

He locked eyes with her over Olga’s shoulder and she smiled at him apologetically.

“You could not have told me?” he asked irritably.

“I’m old. I didn’t expect it to last. And by the time it became clear it was viable…” Rosemary shrugged, clearly uncomfortable. “It became easier to tell you in person.”

Dmitri stared at her, aghast. True, that first night of the conference, they had been so eager to get to one another that protection had been the last thing on their minds, but as Rosemary had said at the time, she was perimenopausal. The chances of one unprotected encounter resulting in consequences had been infinitesimal.

But apparently not as infinitesimal as they’d hoped.

“What are the two of you talking about?” asked Olga, breaking the awkward silence that had grown between them. Olga looked down at Rosemary, who had placed a hand on her stomach instinctively, and then over at Dmitri.

“Oh you did _NOT_.” Olga looked back to Rosemary. “Pregnant? Rosie, you are forty-five! You have no business getting pregnant at your age!”

Rosemary smiled her guilty smile up at Olga. “I know.” Rosemary turned back to Dmitri. “We’ll talk? I don’t… I don’t expect anything from you, you know. Just… whatever you are willing to give.”

Dmitri found his mouth suddenly too dry to speak a word and could only nod.


	4. Chapter 4

Rosemary had hoped that the promise of a talk would breach the sudden awkward distance, more mental than physical, that had sprung up between them the instant Dmitri had realized what her change in shape meant, but Olga’s presence—and more than that, Olga’s many strong opinions about the suitability of Rosemary’s pregnancy—filled the space between them, creating a barrier Rosemary couldn’t quite figure out how to surmount. So instead, she guided the siblings and their luggage out to her car, where Olga (and her opinions) claimed the passenger seat of Rosemary’s little red Bug. Dmitri clambered in to the back seat and immediately shut his eyes, slumping down and leaning his head back. 

He looked exhausted. 

Rosemary glanced longingly at his reflection in the rearview mirror from time to time as she drove, making rote responses to Olga’s continued list of reasons why Rosemary having a baby was completely irresponsible and, at her age, reckless as well.

Rosemary knew it was reckless. But some time over the past four months since she’d first discovered she was pregnant, she’d stopped caring.

“And this will wreck havoc on your career,” said Olga for the fourth time. “I do not understand why you did not immediately put an end to it when you discovered you were pregnant.”

Rosemary opened her mouth to make another rote response, but she was cut off by Dmitri’s angry “Enough, Olga! This is Rosemary’s decision to make, not yours.”

Olga shut up immediately, and Rosemary glanced in the rearview mirror again. Dmitri’s reflection was watching her, and she tried to show him all the gratitude she felt for his intervention in that brief glance.

She loved Olga. Of course she did. Olga had been her friend for over a decade. But sometimes, Olga’s inability to understand why someone would make different choices than the ones that Olga herself thought were best for them… Well. It got a bit tiresome, that was all.

Olga only stayed quiet for a few minutes longer, and then continued in a tight, angry voice. “I would think that you of all people would understand, Dmitri. Pregnancy is dangerous for the mother under ideal circumstances. At Rosemary’s age—”

“Rosemary’s age has nothing to do with it,” interjected Dmitri, his tone icy. “You are just irritated that she did not tell you and let you decide for her what she must do. But it is her decision and you will respect it.”

Olga fell silent again and remained that way until Rosemary pulled into the underground garage under her apartment building. Somehow, Dmitri made it out of the car before Rosemary did; he opened her door for her and offered her a hand that she sorely needed. Sitting down and standing back up had become more and more of a chore as the pregnancy progressed, and Rosemary deeply appreciated the courtesy of a hand up.

She met Dmitri’s eyes again, sure that the guilt she felt about hiding this pregnancy from him was painted all over her face, but she could not read his expression in return. He didn’t drop her hand again once she was upright, however, and she chose to read that as a hopeful sign.

Oh please, let it be a hopeful sign.

While Rosemary and Dmitri had been staring at one another, Olga had pulled her and Dmitri’s bags out of the back of the car. Rosemary managed to break away from Dmitri’s direct gaze to look in Olga’s direction, and Olga looked back contritely.

Olga opened and closed her mouth a few times, then sighed and said “I am sorry. I am worried for you. I do not wish to…” Olga swallowed, and Rosemary thought she saw the tell-tale glisten of tears in Olga’s eyes. “You are my friend,” Olga continued, her voice suddenly harsh. “I do not want to… to lose you. And it is dangerous, Rosie, so so dangerous…”

Rosemary let go of Dmitri’s hand and slipped around him, crossing to few feet to Olga. She wrapped her arms around Olga, pulling her friend close. “Hush. I know, dear. I know. But I have the best care it is possible to get, the best doctor—I’ll take you to meet her, I think you’ll like her—and I’m doing everything I can to make sure this pregnancy is as safe as it can be. I promise.”

Olga wrapped her arms around Rosemary as well in a quick, tight hug, then straightened up and swiped a hand across her cheek, staring at the moisture on her fingers in mock shock. “Oh, where did that come from. You will have to pardon me, Rosemary, it appears I am leaking.”

Rosemary smiled hesitantly at Olga and released her friend. “Well, don’t leak on me.”

Behind her, she heard the car door shut, and then Dmitri was beside her, taking her hand in his own again and looking gravely down at her. Olga shoved the handle of his suitcase into his other hand, then took up station on the other side of Rosemary, tucking her arm through Rosemary’s own.

Rosemary smiled, first up at Olga and then a longer, more tender smile up at Dmitri, which he answered with a small quirk at the corner of his mouth. Rosemary’s smile grew broader in response, and she turned back to the mostly-empty garage.

“Well, shall we?” she asked, and they set off arm in arm, hand in hand, towards the elevator.

A few short minutes later and Rosemary was unlocking her front door, standing aside to let Olga and Dmitri with their luggage in first. 

Olga had released Rosemary’s arm when they had crowded on to the small elevator that took them to the third floor, where Rosemary’s apartment was, but Dmitri had only relinquished his hold on Rosemary’s hand when it became obvious that she needed it to get her apartment keys out of her pocket.

Once they were inside and the door was locked up behind them, Dmitri stepped close and took hold of Rosemary’s hand again. Olga stared at their clasped hands, a rueful expression on her face, and Rosemary wondered for a moment if Olga was regretting her part in Dmitri and Rosemary’s current predicament.

“I am in guest room again, yes, Rosie?” asked Olga, then at Rosemary’s nod continuing with “I think I will go take a nap. It has been a very long day.”

“All right. We’ll work out dinner plans later?”

“Of course,” called Olga back over her shoulder, already halfway down the little hall that lead to the bedrooms.

Rosemary looked up at Dmitri. “The couch pulls out into a bed, if you’d rather not…” Dmitri frowned at that, and Rosemary smiled in response. “Well, yes, I was rather hoping that you’d want to share my bed instead.”

“Lead the way,” he said quietly, and Rosemary escorted him and his luggage down the same little hall, pausing on the way to point out the bathroom before opening the door to her bedroom and pulling Dmitri inside.

He dropped the handle of his luggage with gratifying swiftness and nudged the door shut behind him with his heel as he pulled Rosemary into a close, tight embrace, leaning down to bury his face against her neck.

Rosemary laughed, a little nervously. “You’ll smudge your glasses,” she said, turning her head to nuzzle against his ear.

“You should have told me,” he muttered against her neck. “Blyad, Rosemary, I wish I’d known.”

Rosemary wrapped an arm around his waist and brought the other up across his shoulders, stroking his hair gently. “And what would you have done, hm?”

“I could have been here,” he muttered, before pressing a kiss to her neck.

“And what good would that have done?” Rosemary loosed her hold on him and pulled back a bit, and he released her as well, his hands on her shoulders as he stared forlornly down at her.

Rosemary continued. “If I had called you four months ago and said ‘Dmitri, I’m pregnant, but at my age I’m more likely to miscarry in the next few weeks than to have a viable pregnancy,’ what good would it have done for you to be here, waiting anxiously over those next long weeks for something to happen? If I had called you a month ago, when I was cramping so hard I thought I might die, when I was so sure I was about to lose the baby, what good would it have done for you to be here worrying? I had enough to worry about with just myself.”

Dmitri gave her a stricken look. “Perhaps. But if I had been here, you would not have been alone.” He swallowed, his face suddenly nervous. “And perhaps there would have been something I could have done. To… To ease your pain.”

Rosemary smiled wistfully at him and reached up to cup his cheek in a hand. “You are very sweet. But you were with me, you know. Maybe not physically, but the phone calls, your letters… Those gave me a reason to be happy, even in the worst of it all.”

Dmitri responded to her wistful smile with one of his own, and gathered her close again, tilting her head back with one hand so that he could kiss her more easily. Rosemary slid her arms up around his shoulders, rising up on to her tiptoes to get better access to him, meeting his warm, eager kiss with eagerness of her own. After a few moments of what Rosemary could only think of as making out like teenagers, Dmitri lifted his head, looking down at her with a frightening level of fondness on his face—and an equally frightening amount of exhaustion.

Rosemary frowned. “When did you last sleep?”

Dmitri ran an awkward hand across the back of his head and looked away, shame-faced. “About 48 hours ago,” he admitted.

“Bed. Now,” ordered Rosemary. “We can talk more once you’ve gotten some rest.”

“Stay with me?” he asked, his expression anxious and full of longing.

Rosemary smiled up at him with her entire heart in her eyes. “Of course. Always.”

Rosemary slept propped up on three pillows these days because, as she had said in response to Dmitri’s questioning stare, she got horrible heartburn these days if she tried to sleep flat on her back. So he had curled up next to her with his head tucked against her hip and his arm thrown across her legs, and had fallen asleep almost immediately.

He woke up to the sound of Rosemary snoring gently, and lifted his head to look at her. She was fast asleep, her head thrown back against the top pillow, both of her hands tucked protectively across her stomach.

Rosemary was pregnant. Rosemary was pregnant, and he was going to be a father.

Unless something went wrong—but no, now was not the time to think about things going wrong, now was the time to get used to the idea that if everything went right, he would be a father—when? He did some quick mental math. October. She would be due in October.

Dmitri laid his head against her stomach, between Rosemary’s hands, pressing an ear to it, listening to the gurgles of her digestive system, to the sound of her heartbeat, listening… there. Was that a second heartbeat he could hear? He didn’t even know if that was possible.

“Hello, little one,” he whispered in Russian against Rosemary’s stomach. “I’m your baba.”

He heard a breathy little laugh at that and turned his head to find Rosemary looking down at him, an adoring smile on her face. She lifted a hand off her stomach and ran her fingers through his hair gently.

“Just like that?” she asked.

Dmitri thought he understood. “Yes. Just like that,” he responded, with a smile on his own face.

“We barely know each other, you know. Not as people.”

“We know each other very well as scientists. And we are learning each other as people.”

“Is that enough?” Rosemary asked, a little frown between her eyebrows.

Dmitri sat up, turning to face Rosemary and sitting crosslegged, gathering up the hand that had been stroking his hair in both of his. “It is enough for me. Is it enough for you?”

Rosemary smiled again, a strange, confused smile. “It shouldn’t be. But it is.”

“How does this work?”

Rosemary took a deep breath, and sighed. “Well. I’m overdue for a sabbatical, so I’m taking one next year. After that…”

“I will find a job here. Somehow. I want to be here when baby is born.”

“They’ll be looking for a guest lecturer who can take over some of my seminars. I could recommend you,” Rosemary said. “I was already planning to.”

Dmitri frowned. “You trust me to teach your classes? I did not think… that is, the way we have fought over things in the past…”

Rosemary laughed at that. “Us fighting doesn’t mean I don’t respect your abilities as a scientist, Dmitri. Quite the opposite.”

“Well, I knew that. Still, there are things…”

“It’ll do them good to get a different perspective. They need to learn how to resolve conflicting viewpoints, alternate approaches. It’ll make them better scientists.” Rosemary paused, considering. “Also, you’re one of about three people in the world I trust to even understand what my grad students are working on. Not that I won’t be around, but it’ll be good to have backup.”

Dmitri stared at Rosemary, suddenly struck by the idea that she might not be around, that something might happen—“No,” he said aloud. “I mean, yes, obviously, we should see if I can be a guest lecturer here for a year,” he said, in response to Rosemary’s confused look. “I was just…” he rubbed the back of his neck nervously, looking away.

Rosemary seemed to understand. “What Olga said earlier did get to you, didn’t it,” she said, a plain statement of fact rather than a question.

“Yes,” he said. “I… this is so new, feeling like this. I do not know what it would do to me to lose it. To lose…” he trailed off, staring at Rosemary, hoping that she could see his love for her in his eyes, unable to get the words out.

Rosemary tugged her hand free from Dmitri’s and used her hands to shove herself a bit more upright, then leaned towards him, reaching out to cup his face in her hands. “I understand,” she said, and guided his face closer to her own, pressing a warm, loving kiss to his lips.

He smiled as she kissed him, then began kissing her back in earnest. Before he quite realized what was happening, he was leaning over her, straddling her legs, one hand behind her neck and one tracing the curve of her breast through her dress as their lips met, opened, as tongues touched and explored.

Rosemary let out a deep moan against his mouth, tugging frantically at his shirt, untucking it, running her hands up his bare back. Dmitri shivered and pulled back, taking his shirt off and tossing it to the floor next to the bed, and Rosemary’s hands moved to the button of his trousers. “You’re wearing entirely too much clothing,” she muttered, undoing the button and starting in on the zipper with shaking hands.

“Wait,” said Dmitri, putting his hands over hers to still them. “Is it safe? I mean, for the—”

“If you think I did not ask my doctor extensive questions about the safety of having sex while pregnant the instant I knew you were coming to visit, then you do not know me,” said Rosemary, smiling up at him seductively. “It’s no more dangerous than any other physical activity at this point in the pregnancy, and being pregnant has made me as horny as hell, so if you do not get undressed within the next ten seconds I am likely to start ripping your clothing off.”

Dmitri’s breath left him in a rush. He slid off the bed and stripped himself bare, gave Rosemary a hand with her own clothing when the zipper of her dress turned into too much work, laughed with her when their first attempt to find a position that worked around the bulk of her belly resulted in a failure.

The sex was fast, explosive; she had not been lying when she said she was horny, and her body was apparently on a hair trigger where orgasms were involved. He stifled her moans with a kiss, deep, passionate, putting the words he couldn’t quite bring himself to say into every action. And then his own climax came, and he collapsed against her, burying his face against her shoulder again, inhaling the scent of her.

Rosemary laughed breathlessly and held him against her. “God I’ve missed you.”

“I love you,” he said.

He felt her smile against his temple. “I noticed.”

Dmitri lifted himself, as much to take pressure off her stomach as to look down at her. “And you?”

She laughed. “If you don’t know I love you too, you haven’t been paying attention.”

“I am not always good at reading people.” He swallowed hard. “And I thought that perhaps I was only seeing what I wished to, and not what was really there.”

Her expression was serious as she reached up to cup his face in both of her hands. “Then I’ll say it properly.” She lifted her head just enough to press a kiss to the middle of his forehead, and then pulled back to look him in the eye. “I love you, Dmitri Vologin. Now let’s make a family.”

Dmitri did not think he would ever stop smiling.


End file.
